


five times they disrobed (for science)

by theinvisiblequestion



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-04
Updated: 2014-03-13
Packaged: 2018-01-14 12:58:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1267417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theinvisiblequestion/pseuds/theinvisiblequestion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A pot of tea, volatile chemicals, antiserum, radiation, and thermal excess.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hot Tea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While studying for final exams, Fitz spills a pot of tea.

Afternoon tea was never as important as during exams. The table in Fitz’s room got cleared off to make way for one teapot on a warming plate, one bowl of sugar cubes, two cups, and two helpings of lecture notes. Sometimes there were biscuits, if Simmons took time to make them, or if Fitz snuck some out of the cafeteria.

“Are you going to eat that?” Fitz asked, pointing at the last biscuit on the plate half-covered by one of Fitz’s diagrams.

Simmons shook her head. “You eat it.” Those ones were his favorite, the thin square ones with chocolate on one side.

He picked up the biscuit and ate it in two swift bites. “D’you think they’ll notice if I don’t know the exact function of a zeta-neutrino loop in an epsilon-configured quantum phase grid?”

“You made that up.”

“I did not!” Fitz rifled through a stack of grid papers and yanked one out with a flourish. He made to brandish it at Simmons as proof that it was a Real Thing, but hit the teapot instead. Before she could realize her study partner had dumped a fresh pot of tea into her lap, Simmons was out of her chair, slapping at the scalding hot tea soaking through her sweats. Her frantic attempts to brush herself off were futile; she could feel the tea burning her legs.

She didn’t think twice before tugging the waistband of her sweats down past her knees. Her legs were bright red where the tea had soaked through the fleece, and the air circulating through the room made the raw skin sting.

She looked up and saw Fitz still standing with his hands outstretched, as if to catch the teapot. “Fitz!” she snapped. “I need ice.”

Fitz blinked, stammered something Simmons didn’t hear, and turned to the mini-fridge.

Simmons stripped her sweats off the rest of the way; she wasn’t about to pull the sopping wet fleece back on, and it was still pretty warm. She noticed now that her notes were soaked, too, and stained with thick, triple-strength tea. They weren’t completely ruined; most of the tea had sloshed onto her lap, and she’d only had a couple of pages directly in front of her. The spill had, thankfully, missed the stack of books to the left of her chair.

“I’m _really_ sorry about that,” Fitz said before he noticed she was no longer wearing trousers. He averted his eyes instinctually, and handed her the cold pack: a damp, refrigerated towel in a plastic bag. She pressed it against one leg and then the other, and then picked up her sweats and hung them over the back of her chair. She tried to hold the cold pack against her legs while she helped clean up the spill, until Fitz elbowed her out of the way. “Sit down! It’s my fault. I’ll clean it up. You just go tend to your, uh, burns.”

She sat on Fitz’s bed, since her chair was occupied by a puddle of tea, and laid the cold press across both legs. It felt better now, and she wouldn’t have any lasting damage. She’d wear a skirt tomorrow, maybe, and a pair of knee-high socks, and she’d be just fine.

“Do you want to borrow a pair of trousers?” Fitz asked. “Or I can get you something from your room.”

“If you were too shy to see your best friend in her knickers, you oughtn’t’ve spilled a pot of tea on her.”

“I’m not—it’s not—” Fitz blushed. “I don’t want you to get cold, that’s all. A blanket, maybe? While your sweats dry out?”

Simmons smiled. “You’ve convinced me,” she said.

When he’d settled the throw over her, he asked, “D’you want a cuppa?” It was a reflex, courtesy of their British upbringings, and he swore under his breath when he realized what he’d said. “I promise I won’t spill this one on you.”


	2. Volatile Chemicals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fitz helps Simmons prepare for a chemistry lab experiment.

“Careful,” Simmons warned. The chemicals she was working with in the Academy lab were highly volatile, but since Fitz had a chem lab pass, he’d agreed to help her with some of the grunt work for next week’s lab prep.

“I know,” Fitz said, annoyed. She’d only said it a hundred times so far, and he wasn’t about to fool around with stuff like this. It’d eat his flesh clean down to the bone if he got sloppy, and while he could probably stand to lose a pound or two in the event they ever went into the field (which wasn’t likely), acid might be more painful than running.

He successfully set the test tube in its slot above the Bunsen burner, and Simmons shooed him away so she could work her biochem magic on it.

“I need the other one, too,” she said.

He picked it up with the tongs from its resting station and carried it over to her workstation, watching it closely. He slid the test tube into the slot she pointed to and set the tongs down. “What about the beaker?”

“Yes, please, but don’t walk too fast or it’ll spill out the top—pentamic acid doesn’t like a lot of movement.”

Fitz had never heard of pentamic acid, but he supposed she knew what she was doing. He pulled on thick gloves and slowly picked up the beaker. The moment he lifted it off the table, he knew exactly what she meant. The liquid sloshed wildly around the beaker at the slightest movement, and though there were only a couple of millilitres in the container, the liquid jumped as high as the 700mL line—almost three-quarters of the way up the glass.

It wasn’t even a proper stumble, really. He just set his foot down a little too hard and it made his whole body move the wrong way—not even a lurch! But the jumpy liquid disagreed. It sloshed out the top of the container straight onto Fitz’s jumper, and the wool instantly started smoking. Startled, he dropped the container. It shattered, making Simmons squeak, but the entire contents of the container had leapt onto Fitz’s chest.

He seized the back of his collar and yanked the jumper off over his head, followed in quick succession by the white collared shirt he wore under it, and then both of the gloves. He’d been fast enough to keep the acid from burning his skin, but not fast enough to keep it from burning a hole like a cannonball wound in the thick knit. The white shirt, too, was stained an orange-brown where the acid had singed it, but there had not been enough contact for the acid to burn completely through the shirt.

“Fitz! Are you burnt? Did the acid get through your shirt?”

Fitz shook his head. “No. I’m alright. Sorry I ruined your experiment.”

Simmons picked the jumper up by an untainted sleeve and flung it into the hazard bin, and Fitz threw the white shirt after it. The gloves were unharmed, and Fitz started to pick up the broken pieces of glass (they were surprisingly clean). The panic over, Jemma’s mouth unleashed a torrent of apology. “No, no. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have let you carry that without full splash gear; it’s incredibly dangerous and it might have—”

He interrupted her, dumping a handful of glass into the hazard bin with his still-smoking clothes. “Yes, I’m absolutely torn up that you ruined my favorite jumper.”

The comment stopped her in her tracks. Was he serious, or was that sarcasm? Was he annoyed with her for putting him in danger?

Fitz pulled off the gloves and set them on the counter next to her Bunsen burner. “I’m kidding. I’ve got other jumpers, and honestly I was a bit fed up with that one anyway. D’you see how big it was? I swear it ate all my socks.”

Simmons giggled despite her worry. “I am _really_ sorry. I should have given you a splash guard.”

“I know all the chem lab safety rules, too, Simmons. It’s not your fault the acid jumped on me. Why’s it do that, anyway?”

Simmons shrugged. “I’m not sure. I don’t think it’s from Earth, though.”

“Is the whole experiment ruined, then?”

“No. I just have to get another beaker from Containment. I’m not going to fail chemistry just because you’ve got elephant feet.”

“ _I’ve_ got elephant feet?” Fitz balked. “What about _you_? Always stomping around when I’m trying to study. Speaking of, I’ve got an exam tomorrow, and I really ought to get back to the books.” He pointed behind him, toward the door. The air con vent above him kicked on just then, and he remembered that he wasn’t wearing a shirt. “Uh, d’you have something I can wear? It’s a bit cold.”

“Can’t walk back to the dorm without a shirt?” Jemma teased. “I might have an extra lab coat, so long as you promise not to spill any acid on it.”

“Sure,” he said, and when she went to the supply closet to find it, he muttered, “Why’s it always _me_ in trouble for spilling things?”


	3. Antiserum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While Simmons is burning the midnight oil, turbulence on the Bus creates a contamination breach.

It’s late and Fitz has already gone to bed, but Jemma’s wide awake. She’s working on a side project, an antiserum for something she found in the S.H.I.E.L.D. databanks. The biocontainment protocols are on, because it’s a bio-agent capable of destroying whole villages at once if latched onto an airborne vector. The antiserum, of course, is developed as an airborne, to maximise efficacy, but she’s got samples of the original in Petri dishes on her table.

She dips a pipette into one of the Petri dishes and releases it into a half-full beaker of distilled water. It’s harmless, as long as she doesn’t drink it, and they only drink out of beakers in the Cellar. She supposes it might get airborne if she spills it, so she makes sure it’s well away from the edge of the table. She repeats the process with three more beakers, and then marks them with a wax pencil.

She’s just finished preparing the candidates for the antiserum and is about to prep her microscope slides when the Bus hits turbulence and the beaker on the end of the row tips over, splashing the diluted bio-agent across the table and onto Jemma’s clothes. She has a mask over her face, but she pulls it tighter as she runs to the wall and slams her hand on the containment alarm. It doesn’t sound anywhere outside the lab, but down in the cargo hold, the lab lights turn red and the Holotable tells her to step into the decon shower while it neutralizes the bio-agent with a radiation sweep.

The decon shower makes her take off any articles that got even a little bit damp from the dilution, which means she’s left standing in her underthings, socks, and trainers. Her lab coat took the worst of it, but it splashed down onto her shirt and her skirt as well. The tiny cubicle proceeds to decontaminate her, which takes a while.

She steps out and looks for her extra lab coat, but she doesn’t have one.

The laundry. She and Fitz had taken all their stuff in the last time they were at the Hub two days ago, but of course they hadn’t gotten around to bringing the extra lab coats downstairs—they only used them when they were doing dangerous science.

She stands in the decontaminated lab, staring at the puddle of water that’s come out of the beaker, and wonders if anyone would notice if she snuck up to her room wearing only her underwear.

The lab door opens with a hydraulic whisper. “Simmons, have you seen my—what are you doing?”

Jemma blushes and crosses her arms over herself, pointing to the spilled experiment. “We hit turbulence, and the beaker fell over and I had to hit the containment alarm—it’s dangerous if it’s airborne—but the extra lab coats are all upstairs and—”

Fitz snorts, giggling like a schoolboy.

“Fitz!”

“I’m sorry! It’s just—for once it’s not _me_. I’ll get you something from upstairs.” He walks out, and returns five minutes later (what on _earth_ took him _five minutes_?) with a shirt and a pair of her favorite sweats. “Maybe you should put that stuff away for now,” he says. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly good hazard locker just waiting for a couple of beakers.”

“It doesn’t matter; the serum’s inert anyway. The radiation sweep did it in.”

“Wait, is that the 752-Rho from last April?”

Simmons nodded. “Yeah. I’m running out of samples, though.”

“But—the radiation killed it.”

“Yes, and if I hadn’t been in the decon shower, the radiation would have killed me, too. Not a very effective solution,” she says.

“Shame,” Fitz says. “Accidental discoveries are always remembered the most: gravity, displacement…”

Simmons rolls her eyes and grabs a few paper towels to clean up the spill.


	4. Radiation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of alien tech sets off the lab's radiation alarm.

Fitz is skeptical about letting alien stuff sit around the lab after the Chitauri incident, but they don’t have a choice. He takes precautions, though. When they’re not actively studying it, the device gets locked away inside layers and layers of protective materials.

Today, they’re trying to get images of its insides for the Holotable, but not even the D.W.A.R.F.s can get consistent readings. Fitz tries not to get impatient, but it’s been going crazy all day, and it’s impossible to figure out what’s inside the smooth, featureless cube.

He lets out a shout of exasperation and leans on the Holotable. “What the hell _is_ this thing?!”

Simmons has been working at it with dogged determination, but she’s gotten no more results than he has. “I don’t know, but we are going to find out, because I did not go through that much graduate school to be defeated by a little metal box.” The words are optimistic, but her voice drips with frustration. She wants nothing more than to take this stupid metal box and bash it with a hammer, though based on what readings she’s managed to get so far, it would take a very special hammer to break it open.

And then all of a sudden it’s open on the table, its sides unfolded into a nice, neat cross, and at the juncture of the arms is a jumble of little gears.

“What did you do?” Fitz asked, shocked.

Simmons is just as surprised. “I have no idea. I just thought about breaking it open and—”

The safety protocol kicks in, alarm crying softly in time with the pulsing red warning lights. The lab computer announces a radiation hazard and Simmons nearly drops her tablet. _“Please proceed to the radiation shower.”_

Fitz’s eyes widen. He knows as well as Simmons the size of the radiation shower. They have a small lab; the radiation shower is proportionally small, and does _not_ fit two. Not comfortably, anyway.

It’s only a Level-2 radiation breach, so they get to keep their underthings, but they stand back to back anyway, not looking at each other. They each wonder what it would be like to turn just ninety degrees. He wonders what her silhouette looks like, if the geometry of her curvature is symmetric. She wonders—with purely scientific curiosity—how his proportions deviate from the average of the species, and then blushes furiously, thankful he can’t see, when the vision enters her mind of her best friend standing with his fists on hips, feet shoulder-width apart, clad in nothing but his pants and a pair of mismatched socks.

The radiation shower dumps a pair of lab coats on them when it’s finished cleaning them off, and Simmons is glad she remembered to stash a change of clothes in the lab after the last decon incident. She’s still red-faced when they leave the decon shower, but so is he, and they tacitly agree never to speak of it to anyone.


	5. Thermal Excess

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jemma worries about Fitz being in the field.

Jemma Simmons used to love the excitement and adrenaline of field work. The danger and the rewards were more intense than anything she’d ever done. She was part of a team designed to protect the citizens of Earth and its countries, and she had begun her work on the Bus with stars in her eyes.

The rosy tint on her metaphorical safety goggles has worn away. She hates field work now, hates the stress of sending her best friend and partner on missions, even with Ward at his side. She hates leaving the lab. She’s starting to hate the Bus, too, not because it’s too cramped or because it flies around the globe, but because it takes them into danger.

She wants to go back to the Academy and teach freshman about quantum biophysics and spend long nights working in her lab and never, ever go into hot zones. She doesn’t think Fitz feels the same way. He tells her with enthusiasm all about his exciting, terrifying missions, about taking the DWARFs in and “bringing finesse to the art of reconnaissance.” She’s glad he likes it, but she wishes he didn’t. It would be easier for her if they both hated field work. She worries about him. She worries about herself, what she would do without him. She doesn’t like to think about it, but every time the Bus goes into the air, it’s a very real possibility.

It’s one of those terrifying, worrisome missions that he’s come back from. She and Agent May are the only ones on the grounded Bus, waiting for sight or sound of the boys. Skye’s still in rehab, working off the side effects of being shot in the chest. The mission wasn’t supposed to be this dangerous, and that makes her feel even worse. She’s worried for Coulson and Ward, of course, but they have years of fighting experience. Fitz only knows basic self-defense, and he hadn’t done much better than Jemma on the firearms qualification.

She’s bitten three of her fingernails to the quick—a habit she’d kicked in sixth form that comes back when she’s properly nervous—and started on a fourth when the cargo bay door opens. The Bus is in the air before the door closes, and it takes Jemma a moment to realize they’ve got the boys back on board. Coulson’s leaning against the van, panting heavily. There’s blood on his face, but even from here she can tell he’s okay; most of it isn’t his. Ward looks much the same, though there’s less blood on his face and more on his shirt. Fitz appears to be covered in blood from head to toe, and Ward is practically holding him up. He looks to be in bad shape.

Simmons doesn’t even try to stop herself from running out of the lab. She doesn’t care that she’s wearing  a shirt she actually likes and Fitz is a bloody mess. She latches onto him briefly before stepping back and inspecting him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” he says. He sounds winded, and Jemma realizes he’s not been shot or stabbed. She wonders briefly how far they ran, and how fast.

She throws her arms around Fitz again. “I was so worried. When we lost communication, we knew something had gone wrong, but—”

“Simmons,” Fitz interrupts. “I get that you’re freaking out, but you might let me get a glass of water.”

“Right. Yes. And, uh, maybe a towel.” His shirt is ruined, but she might be able to save the jeans. He’ll need a shower as well. Maybe two. She tears her eyes away from him, reminding herself that he won’t vanish if she looks away, only to find that there’s no one else in the cargo bay. She hears the _clank-clank_ of footsteps on the metal stairs, and turns to see Coulson and Ward trudging up the spiral staircase. Coulson never lets Simmons patch him up, and Ward never admits to needing it.

She cracks open a cold bottle of water from the lab fridge while Fitz washes his hands, red soap swirling into the drain. She finds a rag and sets to making sure he really is okay. When he’s downed all 16.9 ounces (she’s always thought it was an odd figure; why not 17?), he starts telling her all about the mission, how it was a regular piece-of-pie recon until something went wrong and—

“Fitz!” she snaps. She can’t stand to listen to it, not because it’s boring or terrifying, but because he doesn’t seem to notice that it’s dangerous and it terrifies her whenever he goes out and his retellings only make her relive _her_ side of the story. “Stop it!”

“What?”

She walks a few paces away, bloody rag in one hand. Her eyes water, blurring the different white surfaces of the lab into one pristine blob. She shakes her head, unable to speak. She’s never cried over him going into the field, even when he’s gone. The last time she cried on the Bus was just after Skye was shot.

“Simmons?” He’s trying to be kind and gentle, but she knows his curiosity won’t let him leave her alone, even if she were to scream in his face.

She scrubs at her eyes with the heel of her empty hand as she turns to face him. She takes a long, shaking breath. “I’m terrified, Fitz. I thought field work would be fun, but it’s—it’s not. Every time you go out on missions, I worry. What would I do if you didn’t come back?”

“Jemma…” Fitz takes the rag from her hands and starts scrubbing at his forearms. His hands are still stained in places, but he’s gotten most of the blood off so far. “I’ll _always_ come back,” he promises. “I’m a bit useless without you, if I’m honest.” A corner of his mouth lifts in a sheepish smile.

Simmons backs away from him, crossing her arms over herself. “I’m not kidding around. I don’t _like_ field work any more. You were right. I’d rather be in a lab underground, far away from all this running around and getting shot at.”

“I don’t like it either! You think _you’ve_ got it bad— _I’m_ the one getting shot at! And I don’t have the time to wonder if I’ll ever see you again because I’m too bloody busy trying not to _die_.”

Simmons scoffs. “You _like_ the danger! You make it sound so romantic in all your stories.”

“Yeah, because _you_ like fieldwork but you never get to go, not since you jumped out of the plane—which, by the way, I still haven’t forgiven you for.”

“I didn’t see any other option,” she spits. “I wasn’t going to risk _everyone_ dying.”

“You could have at least taken a parachute with you!”

“What would it matter if I had a parachute? I was going to _die_.”

“Yeah, and I don’t bloody need reminding about that, thanks!” His hands are balled into tight fists, and she’s in tears.

It’s not worth fighting about, she realizes. All the fight drains out of her, and she slouches against the table. “I’m sorry, Fitz. If you want to go out with Ward and Coulson, I—I’ll be okay.”

Fitz is still riled up. “Well, I’m bloody sorry, too! Maybe if someone had told me it was going to be this bloody dangerous, I’d have tried harder to get you to stay at the Academy.”

Jemma sniffles.

Fitz realizes she’s not arguing any more, and he throws the blood-stained rag onto the table. He huffs, and then says, “Jem, don’t—I’m sorry.” He reaches for her, but she twists away and runs out of the lab.

She makes it all the way to her bunk, bloodstains still on her jumper and her jeans, before tears start falling in earnest. She peels off the dirty clothes and puts on a tanktop and sweats, and then crawls under her favorite throw, clutches a pillow, and cries. Cries because she’s always terrified Fitz is going to die, or she’s going to die, or worse. Cries because Fitz is right, damn it, and she hates field work, hates the danger, but knows she’d never be happy in a normal lab, either. Cries because Fitz hates the constant possibility of dying, too, and it’s her fault he’s been dragged into it. And then she cries just because there are more tears left, and eventually she stops crying. Her head is throbbing and her throat is sore and her eyes are puffy and red, so she washes her face in her little sink. She’s drying her hands when someone knocks on her door.

“Jemma?”

It’s Fitz, of course, and when she opens the door, he’s in clean clothes (a t-shirt and sweats, too), his hair is damp, and he appears to be clean of all the blood. There’s a bandage on his forehead, but it’s not big, and his jaw looks bruised.

“I’m sorry I dragged you into this, Fitz,” she says.

He shakes his head and sighs. “Stop it. I just—I wanted to make sure you were okay before I go pass out. The adrenaline’s wearing off, and—” He yawns. “Yeah, that.”

Jemma giggles despite herself, and Fitz gives her a smile in return. “I am, though. Sorry, I mean.”

“Oh, my _god_ ,” Fitz sighs in loud exasperation and starts to walk away, but Jemma catches him by the arm, surprising both of them.

“I—sorry. I just—I mean, if you need a nap…” She doesn’t know how to put into words that she needs to know he’s still there and he’s okay, that he’s not dead or kidnapped or injured. “Don’t go? I mean, you don’t _have_ to go, if you want to—”

He doesn’t respond for what feels like aeons, but then he walks in and slides her door shut. She finds an extra pillow for him in her closet and he’s asleep before she even pulls a blanket over him. All the worrying and crying has worn her out, too, and she falls asleep almost instantly.

She wakes up in the middle of the night and it’s so stuffy in her bunk that she shrugs off Fitz’s arm around her and kicks off the blanket.

“Jmm?” he mumbles.

“’S too hot,” she says, still half asleep herself.

“Yeah,” he agrees.

Her sweats are living up to their name, and after a full minute of sweltering stuffiness, she gives up and kicks them off, too. The air circulating through the room is much more comfortable on her bare legs than the sweat-damp pyjamas.

Fitz copies her, kicking off the blanket and his sweats, all without opening his eyes. He pats the bed next to him, feeling for Jemma’s hand, and then she scoots in next to him, more comfortable without all the layers suffocating her. He smells like night sweat and shampoo and that strange metallic undertone that’s always present on him. He wraps one arm around her and they both fall back into a blissful, dreamless sleep.


End file.
